


nothing lasts forever, but this is gonna take me down

by the_inner_darkness



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Angst, Funerals, I Blame Tumblr, I Don't Even Know, I'm Sorry, M/M, No Happy Ending Fest
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-07
Updated: 2019-10-07
Packaged: 2020-11-26 20:47:36
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20936504
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_inner_darkness/pseuds/the_inner_darkness
Summary: There's four corners of a picture frame, and one casket. Lots of people and he still feels alone. There's freckles in the stars and a tightening corset around his chest and Kuroo can't quite breathe.





	nothing lasts forever, but this is gonna take me down

**Author's Note:**

> HEYY LOOK WHO'S BACK WITH MORE ANGST WHAT AM I EVEN DOING DAMN.
> 
> I wrote this a really long time ago, and I thought it was pretty okay so HERE'S WHAT I SPENT THE LAST TWO DAYS EDITING.
> 
> I HOPE Y'ALL ENJOY!

_I’m sitting here in the library, that used to be our place. I’m sitting here in our usual window seat, and it’s breaking my heart that you aren’t here as well. It hurts because tomorrow is your birthday and all I can think is that you belong here with me._

_But you’re not here._

_And I miss you._

_I miss how content and happy you made me feel when we sat here. I miss the way I felt safe just knowing you were by my side. I miss the way your clear green eyes would look at me. I miss the funny faces you would make at me when you got bored. I miss how we both had a pile of books we read here. I miss the way your black coffee looked next to my green tea. I miss the conversations we had at this table. I miss how your hand fit into mine. I miss how sitting here with you was everything I wanted in that moment. I miss everything from when you were here._

_I miss you._

* * *

There's one drop, two, three running across his cheeks and Kuroo Tetsurou knows that it isn't rain this time.

  
There's four corners of a picture frame, and one casket. Lots of people and he still feels alone. There's freckles in the stars and a tightening corset around his chest and Kuroo can't quite breathe.   
  
His fingertips twitch, the lines in his palms deepening and then falling flat as his hands remember that they're alone, they're alone. The wind flits between the gaps of his thumbs, blowing cold air across his skin, like an apology. His tears are hot, searing across his gentle skin like tangled flames. Eyelashes thick and lips chapped, he isn't as bitter as much as he is sorry.   
  
Kuroo used to be sturdy, used to be like the way cinder blocks shatter, used to surge like a gentle hurricane under the rib cage. Now he's just reminiscent of a photograph, an accumulation of inconsistencies and timelines that are fraying at the arrows. He's freshly twenty-two now, or twenty-three, he's twenty something but he doesn't know fully the exact digits because all he knows is that it's their fault. It's the fault of the numbers, the fault in the numbers, the fault of him as a travesty and he's the reason that his tie feels like a noose and his suit is much too dark.   
  
He feels a hand on his shoulder, feels fingertips through his coat, and he turns to look up at glasses that throw him back at himself.   
  
"Stop it," Akaashi says, lips pale and barely moving because Kuroo knows Akaashi, and he knows that his voice is low because if he's loud, you'd be able to tell that his chest is thick and his nose is stuffed and he's been crying.   
  
"Stop what?"   
  
"Stop this." He gestures to Kuroo as a whole, to the lip between his teeth and the stuttering breaths.   
  
"I don't-"   
  
"Stop feeling like it's your fault."   
  
Kuroo almost stops breathing at this, just freezes, fingers curling in until he has fists for hands and a cold chest. He laughs, sharp and bitter, the sound making both of them flinch.   
  
"Well, it is, isn't it?"   
  
Akaashi is breathing quickly now, chin jutting up into the air, head shaking fast. "No. It's not."   
  
"It is." Kuroo lifted a hand, raised it to their surroundings and waved it at the flowers and tissue boxes and the lemon-smelling wood. He dipped his head, speaking softly, "It's completely my fault. If it hadn't been for me, Tsukishima-"   
  
"Tsukishima would be nothing."   
  
He was cut off by thumbs squeezing the crooks of his elbows, his body rattling as Akaashi shook him back and forth. His eyes reflected the moon, wide and slowly burning, lips parting as his voice rose.   
  
"Tsukishima would be nothing," he said again, voice softer. "Tsukishima would be sitting at home, absorbing his own lack of self-worth. Tsukishima would be trying to figure out the best way he could just disappear and there'd be no one to anchor him to the world. Tsukishima wouldn't even be the Tsukishima we knew without you. And if you're going to blame yourself, you're derailing everything, everything that he ever felt about you."   
  
Kuroo's eyes slid to the side despite how close they were, arms hanging limply in Akaashi's grip.   
  
"You can stand here and tell yourself that yeah, maybe if you hadn't been born, Yama would be alive. But ask yourself if he'd be happy."   
  
Akaashi's long fingers slowly let go of Kuroo, warm skin subtracting away and eyes closing into a whisper, "He wouldn't want you to hurt."   
  
He turned on his heel, dress shoe scuffing as he started his way towards the parking lot. Kuroo could see the strength in his shoulders, the sure step of his legs, but under the silhouette of the moonlight and the streetlamps, Akaashi's hands were shaking too.

* * *

It had been three days before Kuroo's birthday.   
  
_That's seventy-two hours, or four thousand thirty-two minutes, or two hundred fifty-nine thousand two-hundred seconds. It's a few thousand heartbeats. _  


_They all belonged to you._

  
They'd been on the couch, Kuroo's back to the couch and face towards Tsukishima, who was between his arms. Their lips were tangled, gentle slides of tongues and soft bites, parting for air and only air just to lean back in and kiss until their lips were buzzing.   
  
Tsukishima pulled away, a small smile on his warm lips as he sat up. His feet touched the ground, his legs carrying him up and away towards the door, sweater over fingertips as he started searching for shoes.   
  
"Where are you going?"   
  
Tsukishima had turned to hold up a hand and wave as he fumbled for keys, "I just had the perfect idea for your present. It's a really bad time to come up with it, I know, but I need to get it now before I forget."   
  
"Kei, I told you, you don't even need to-"   
  
“I know I don't need to. But I want to. I'll be back soon, don't worry."

  


He didn't come back.

* * *

“Is this Kuroo Tetsurou? I'm very sorry to inform you that Tsukishima Kei has been found to have met with an accident-”

There could be heard a crash of the plate he was carrying, the drop to his knees, bones splintering from the inside out. He remembered the sound of quiet shouts, of deathly loud whispers, of the ways his eyes were screaming and his body was rapidly sinking. Tsukishima was imprinted on him, imprinted from the calloused hands and fingertips pressed against cheeks and the gentle tsunami of his kisses.  
  
Kuroo closed his eyes and heard his laugh.

* * *

"I know it's over but I think the stars still shine for you," Kuroo said softly, fingers lacing with each other.  
  
"You used to always try to connect the dots with them, like you could make your own constellations."   
  
He laughed now, soft and sharp in the wind, tears falling hard.   
  
"The leaves still fall just for you too. You loved the autumn. The smell of the everything and the color orange everywhere and-" his voice broke, hand coming up to grip at his throat, "I remember one time when I tucked a leaf behind your ear and it made you so happy."   
  
Kuroo swallowed hard, a painful lump in his throat, eyes closed around tears as he bent down to pick up a leaf.   
  
"I remember everything about you," he said softly, moonlight taking his words and folding them, tucking them just around Tsukishima's headstone.   
  
"I remember the first time I saw you, in high school." He laughed again, this time quietly, tightly in his chest.   
  
"You were so withdrawn and distant and I think just about everyone expected absolutely nothing. But then you rose, like a phoenix from the ashes. Amazing, Kei. That's all you've ever been."   
  
Kuroo dropped the leaf, watching it spiral and flutter in a dance to the grass.   
  
"Just amazing."   


So amazing that the Death himself wished to take you.

  
He breathed hard, letting the air drift out his nose, pushing from his lungs. He kept his eyes closed, bit down on his lip once, twice, and felt a tear slip around his eyelashes.   
  
Hands splayed in the grass and gripping the ground, he still hears Kei's laugh, and it sounds so far away.

* * *

_ I am stuck, stuck in the past, stuck in the moment when everything was so beautiful; when you were there, but now you are gone. It’s been two months since we talked, on the sofa, as you were leaving to buy a present, and will never talk again, not where you have gone, but I still remember all the good times and all the things you said to me like it was yesterday and those memories are what keep me stuck and sometimes I don’t know what to do, how to stop missing you. _

**Author's Note:**

> :D apparently I can't write anything that actually involves characters being alive.


End file.
